Rain hands Stewart another pole

Qualifying for Saturday night's event was scheduled for Friday afternoon but rain halted Nationwide Series qualifying with only two cars left to complete their runs, and officials decided to allow time for the track to be dry in order to resume the session.

However, with the schedule being pushed back due to the wait and the Nationwide Series race planned for later in the evening, it was decided to cancel Sprint Cup qualifying.

As the NASCAR rulebook states, starting positions will be determined according to the owner standings, which basically mirrors the current state of the drivers' championship, at least for those in the top 28 positions.

Stewart had inherited pole positions due to rain at Pocono, Loudon and now at Daytona. He lost pole position at Pocono after switching to a back up car and last week he finished fifth after staring first in a rain-shortened race at New Hampshire.

The two-time champion, who has won at Daytona twice in the summer event, was one of the strongest during Thursday practice while running in the draft, and is among the favourites to take victory after running strong in January at the 2.5-mile speedway, when finishing eighth on his back up car.

Jeff Gordon, a six-time winner at Daytona will start from the front row for the seventh time this year, while his team-mate Jimmie Johnson will share the second row of the grid with Penske's Kurt Busch, who has reverted to the old version of the Dodge engine for this weekend.

David Reutimann had been fastest in the final practice session but he will start from the back of the grid after being forced to change the engine on his car after practice. David Ragan led the first practice session of the weekend and he will be starting the race from 31st.

Greg Biffle and Sam Hornish were involved in an incident also in the final practice, but none of them are expected to lose their initial starting position as they both planned to run the same engine from practice during the race.

Italian Max Papis and Mike Wallace will both miss Sunday's race as among the non-guaranteed drivers, they had the least number of qualifying attempts thus far.

Race line-up:

Pos  Driver              Make
 1.  Tony Stewart        Chevrolet
 2.  Jeff Gordon         Chevrolet
 3.  Jimmie Johnson      Chevrolet
 4.  Kurt Busch          Dodge    
 5.  Carl Edwards        Ford     
 6.  Denny Hamlin        Toyota   
 7.  Ryan Newman         Chevrolet
 8.  Kyle Busch          Toyota   
 9.  Greg Biffle         Ford     
10.  Matt Kenseth        Ford     
11.  Mark Martin         Chevrolet
12.  Juan Montoya        Chevrolet
13.  Kasey Kahne         Dodge    
14.  David Reutimann     Toyota   
15.  Clint Bowyer        Chevrolet
16.  Jeff Burton         Chevrolet
17.  Brian Vickers       Toyota   
18.  Marcos Ambrose      Toyota   
19.  Dale Earnhardt Jr   Chevrolet
20.  Casey Mears         Chevrolet
21.  Joey Logano         Toyota   
22.  Jamie McMurray      Ford     
23.  Elliott Sadler      Dodge    
24.  Martin Truex Jr     Chevrolet
25.  Sam Hornish Jr      Dodge    
26.  Reed Sorenson       Dodge    
27.  Kevin Harvick       Chevrolet
28.  Bobby Labonte       Ford     
29.  Michael Waltrip     Toyota   
30.  AJ Allmendinger     Dodge    
31.  David Ragan         Ford     
32.  David Stremme       Dodge    
33.  Paul Menard         Ford     
34.  Robby Gordon        Toyota   
35.  John Andretti       Chevrolet
36.  Brad Keselowski     Chevrolet
37.  Scott Speed         Toyota   
38.  David Gilliland     Chevrolet
39.  Joe Nemechek        Toyota   
40.  Dave Blaney         Toyota   
41.  Patrick Carpentier  Toyota   
42.  Tony Raines         Dodge    
43.  Regan Smith         Chevrolet